


Parasite's Love Song

by Ariadne_Dai



Category: Chrono Cross, Chrono Trigger
Genre: Allusions to Chrono Cross but mostly Trigger, Canon Related, Coercion, Dubious Morality, Eldritch, Eldritch Abomination, Eldritch Positivity, F/F, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Lavos is the Worst Roommate :/, Mildly Dubious Consent, Minor Divergence From Canon, Past Child Abuse, Post-Canon, Temporal Weirdness, The Darkness Beyond Time, The Time Devourer, Trans Character, Trans!Schala, Weird Eldritch Trans Anthems, Worldbuilding, Xenobiology, Xenopsychology, Zeal Kingdom, cosmic horror, eldritch horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-29
Updated: 2016-05-29
Packaged: 2018-07-10 21:32:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,345
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7008964
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ariadne_Dai/pseuds/Ariadne_Dai
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the end, a maiden and an abomination sit alone together in the dark. </p><p>Perhaps they can come to an understanding.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Parasite's Love Song

**Author's Note:**

> For two who didn't have their chance to be in the light.

The Drinker is trying to get my attention again.

I'm trying to ignore her, as usual. Covering my ears, singing songs to drown out her noise, shutting my mind against her voice.

As usual, it doesn't do much good. She doesn't know how to shut up. And there's a part of her that's louder than noise, like a hand on my arm that pulls and pulls me in a direction I do not want to go, like a weight on me dragging me down, down, into this inky well, until I am pulled to her, and am undone, and I cannot ignore it, I can do nothing but fight the undertow, struggling for one more moment to stay on the surface, to stay alive—

SCHALA.

“Shut up,” I tell her.

SCHALA SCHALA SCHALA SCHALA.

SCHA. LA. LA. SCHA. SCHALASCHALA. LA LA LA.

SCHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA…

LAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA...

JOIN WITH ME.

HELLO. I AM STILL HERE, SCHALA. I DID NOT GO AWAY. I WANT TO TALK TO YOU AGAIN.

WE COULD TALK ABOUT SO MANY THINGS. WE COULD TALK MORE ABOUT JOINING TOGETHER. WHY WON’T YOU JOIN WITH ME? YOU SHOULD BE PART OF ME. WE SHOULD BE ONE CREATURE. IF WE WERE ONE WE COULD EAT THE WHOLE WORLD. IT WOULD BE DELICIOUS. YOU WOULD LOVE IT.

I COULD MAKE THE WORLD SO TASTY FOR YOU, TASTY SCHALA. TASTY GIRL.

DO NOT LOOK AWAY FROM ME. I DO NOT FIND THAT ENJOYABLE. YOU SHOULD STOP DOING IT.

SCHALA.

LOOK AT ME, TASTY GIRL.

I NEED YOU.

She is somewhere between the world's most annoying roommate and a horrifying ungodly, planet-eating abomination. I don't know which is worse.

Either way, I'm stuck in here with her in the darkness.

I don't know how long I've been in here, listening to her inane prattle. It could be hours. It could be years. It could be eons by now. Time doesn’t make sense here, and I have no way of keeping track of it. All I know is that I'm trapped in here with a monster. And I have to spend every bit of my strength fighting her pull.

I call her the Drinker because that's how she introduced herself to me. Of course, I knew who she was. My family had studied her. Tried to exploit her existence. I'd seen sketches of her, read speculation about her biology and origins for years. I told her the name we'd given her, which I later found out meant "Big Fire" in a language now long dead. She liked the translation but rejected the name. She has no taste for anything that does not mean on its surface what it means in its depths, any phrase that is not utterly, brutally functional. She took to my language immediately, but only so that she could gnash its nouns and verbs into commands between her teeth.

I AM THE DRINKER, she said. I DRANK YOUR EGG DRY. SO MANY WONDERFUL FLAVORS IT HAD. I TASTED EVERY WAVE AND EVERY COIL. I DRANK THEM DOWN, DOWN INTO ME FROM THE SHELL OF THE EGG AND GREW STRONG. VERY STRONG. AND THEN YOU EGG-DWELLERS TRIED TO DRINK FROM ME. HA HA HA! GOOD TRY. I AM NOT SOMETHING TO BE DRUNK. I AM A DRINKER, LIKE ALL MY MOTHERS BEFORE ME. I HAVE A THIRST AND THE THIRST IS WHAT I AM AND I DRINK YOU DRY, ALL OF YOU WHO ARE THE EGG. YOU CAN ONLY FAIL IF YOU TRY TO DRINK ME. AND YOUR FOOLISHNESS MAKES YOU ALL THE MORE DELICIOUS.

That's her, more or less. A loud, mocking voice in the darkness. With an uncanny form that always made me shudder, and a face I don't want to see.

As for why "she..." that was what she first used. There is something feminine in her voice, as well. Throaty and nasal but high. Like a griping aunt whose throat’s been stained by too much of the dream-leaf. That’s what she sounds like to me. And when her words enter into me, I hear "Mother" and "Sister" more than I do anything else. Perhaps for my own reasons.

Though, personally, I don't think she really cares how I think of her.

She only wants me to throw myself into her gaping maw.

SCHALA.

SCHALA.

YOU ARE TURNING FROM ME AGAIN, SCHALA. SCHALA-GIRL. I COULD STOP CALLING YOU A SCHALA, YOU KNOW. I COULD START CALLING YOU TASTY AGAIN. TASTY GIRL. TASTY BIT OF EGG-MEAT. HOW SILLY YOU ARE. I WANT YOU TO JOIN WITH ME. BUT YOU HAVE TO LOOK AT ME FIRST. DO THAT. DO IT NOW.

For once, I play along. "What makes you think I care at all about what you want, Drinker?"

This puzzles her. BECAUSE IT IS WHAT I WANT.

"I don't have to want what you want, Drinker. In fact, the more you yell at me to do what you want, the less I want to."

Her voice ebbs for a bit. She's confused. THEN HOW DO I GET YOU TO JOIN WITH ME? HOW DO I GET YOU TO GIVE ME WHAT I WANT?

"You can't," I tell her, though I'm not sure if that’s the truth. "It's impossible."

HA HA HA HA HA. THAT IS AMUSING. YOUR JOKE IS TASTY.

"I'm not joking," I fire back. "I don't want to be part of you."

YOUR FOOLISHNESS, THEN. I WILL FIGURE OUT HOW TO HAVE WHAT I WANT, SCHALA-FLAVOR. IT IS ONLY A MATTER OF MY FIGURING IT OUT. I ALWAYS HAVE WHAT I WANT.

"Oh, is that so?" I'm needling her now. She's got me angry. I want to strike back at her. I want to make her feel something for once. "You're an idiot. I know you don't want to be in here, Drinker. You were going to emerge from the planet and have your glorious victory, and guess what? You didn't. You were destroyed. You failed, Drinker. You completely. Failed. How does that feel? I bet it feels just great."

IT DOES NOT FEEL JUST GREAT, she admits. IT IS NOT WHAT I WANTED. YOU ARE RIGHT AND I AM WRONG AND THIS DISPLEASES ME. SOMETIMES YOUR FLAVOR IS NOT SO TASTY, SCHALA-THING. SOMETIMES IT IS DOWNRIGHT TERRIBLE. MY SISTERS WOULD CHOKE ON IT AND SPIT IT OUT, DISGUSTED.

I'm not sure whether to interpret that as a "fuck you."

She is silent for a while. A blessed relief. I DO NOT KNOW WHY IT HAPPENED, she says slowly. BUT I FAILED. She ponders for a moment. I AM SHAMEFUL, she says, with a gnashing sound. I BROKE. I WAS NOT SUPPOSED TO.

"You broke?"

She is staring at me. Somehow I can just tell. YOU WOULD NOT KNOW WHAT IT MEANS TO BREAK. YOU ARE IGNORANT LITTLE TASTY CRAWLING THINGS ON THE SHELL OF THE EGG. YOU ARE MIXED UP IN ITS FLAVOR. YOU ARE NOT WISE LIKE DRINKERS ARE. WE RIDE THE WAKE. WE USE IT. WE CATCH IT AND MOVE IN AND OUT OF IT AND MAKE IT OUR DANCING-RHYTHM. YOU DO NOT KNOW HOW TO DO THAT. YOU ARE STUCK IN THE WAKE. YOU ONLY KNOW HOW TO MOVE ONE WAY. WAKE-WARD. HOW SAD. SADDER STILL THAT I SHOULD HAVE FAILED. THAT I SHOULD BE SO WEAK AS YOU.

"Time," I tell her. "I think you're talking about time."

WHAT IS THIS TIME? YOU THINK OF SHEETS WITH SCRATCHES ON THEM. YOU THINK OF CIRCLES WITH LINES SPINNING ON THEM. THAT IS NOT THE WAKE. THE WAKE IS NOT MADE OF SCRATCHES OR CIRCLES.

"You—that's how we _represent_ time, you alien fool. It's not the circles themselves that are important—they’re just symbols—” I can tell she isn’t listening.

THEY ALWAYS TELL YOU ABOUT BREAKING, she says, dismayed. THE MOTHERS AND THE SISTERS. BUT YOU NEVER THINK IT IS GOING TO HAPPEN TO YOU. FROM WHEN YOU ARE A TINY SPAWN TO WHEN YOU ARE A GREAT STRONG MOTHER, THEIR VOICES REACH ACROSS SPACE AND SAY, DO NOT MISLAY YOUR PATH. SHIFT THE WAKE TO MAKE A DELICIOUS BANQUET FLOW STRAIGHT TO YOU, BUT DON'T RISK IT ALL BECAUSE YOU ARE THE SPAWN WHO THINKS SHE CAN EAT EVERYTHING. NEVER SHIFT IT AWAY FROM YOURSELF. NEVER MAKE OF YOURSELF AN IMPOSSIBILITY. THAT IS HOW YOU BREAK YOURSELF. I BROKE.

I HAD IT ALL LINED UP, EVERY THREAD IN PLACE, JUST AS I WAS SUPPOSED TO. I HAD MY SPAWNPOINT AND MY MOTHER-HARVEST ALL SET. I WAS BEING BORN AND I WAS BEARING, AND MY SYMMETRY WAS PERFECT. EVEN YOU TINY WOULD-BE-DRINKERS WERE NOT A BOTHER TO ME. ONLY A CHANCE TO AUGMENT THE PATTERN. I HAD THE WAKE SET AND I WAS HARVESTING GLORIOUSLY. BUT I MUST HAVE PUT A THREAD SOMEWHERE THAT UNDID ME. WITHOUT WARNING, I WAS HERE IN THIS COLD EMPTY PLACE. NOW I AM BROKEN AND EATEN AND DEAD. HOW SAD.

I AM SURE MY SISTERS HEARD MY DEATH-THROES. I AM SURE THEY TOOK IT AS A WARNING, JUST AS I TOOK THE CRIES OF DYING DRINKERS I HEARD THROUGHOUT MY LIFE. BUT I ALWAYS THOUGHT I WAS NOT SO FOOLISH AS THEM. I WAS NOT SO MESSY AT BUILDING MY NEST IN THE WAKE THAT I WOULD ALLOW THE EGG TO COLLAPSE IN ON ME AND CRUSH ME. AND YET IT DID. I WAS CUT OFF AT THE MOMENT OF MY ASCENSION. I NEVER ENJOYED THE MOTHER-HARVEST. I—I MUST HAVE DONE IT WRONG.

"That was us, not you,” I tell the creature. "We killed you. We humans. You’re a fool if you think any of us would ever join with you. People from every point in time wanted to put a stop to you. Me most of all. I’ve seen it, Drinker. You were slain by my friends. We _won._ "

I think of them now. Their faces swim before me, brightness and color lighting up this darkness. I remember their leader, Crono, a patient red-haired swordsman. I remember blonde, smiling Marle, who knew what it was like to want to escape one’s ancestry.  And I remember Lucca, oh Lucca in her goggles and helmet, the genius, the artificer, who stayed and talked with me, who I knew the best. Just the start of a team gathered from across time and space. My only friends in my time of pain, who won the victory I could not, who brought an end to the crisis my mother began—I didn’t know them as well as I wanted to, but I keep catching glimpses of them in the timestream, and I watch them achieve their triumph, and every time I cheer them on, and my heart fills with pride.

The Drinker, a crisis in her own person, considers the idea of being slain. YOU TASTY EGG-CREATURES WANTED ME TO BREAK? CUT ME OFF BEFORE MY HARVEST? Her tone is emotionless.

WHY?

"Because you _hurt_ us,” I spit. “You've been the cause of everything awful and evil in my life since I was a child, Drinker. When you spawned, you killed millions of people and doomed everyone to a miserable future. That’s what we were fighting to prevent."

THAT IS WHAT A HARVEST IS. I DO NOT SEE HOW IT IS NOT DELICIOUS. NOR WHY IT MAKES YOU TURN AWAY FROM ME.

"Your 'harvest' and our survival aren't mutually compatible," I tell her. "We wanted to survive. We knew you were in the way of that."

AH! she crows. I THINK I UNDERSTAND. IT IS LIKE WHAT HAPPENS WHEN TWO DRINKERS FIND THE SAME EGG. ONLY ONE CAN HAVE IT, OR THE HARVEST WILL BE WRETCHED. THERE IS A CONFLICT AMONG SISTERS.

"Yes," I say, sighing with relief. "You should have gone and left us alone."

She is laughing again. HA HA HA! OH TASTY SCHALA! THAT IS NOT WHAT SISTERS DO. EGGS ARE TOO IMPORTANT TO GIVE OVER TO ANOTHER. WE FIGHT TO THE DEATH. WE BREAK EACH OTHER. WE STRANGLE EACH OTHER WITH THE THREADS OF THE WAKE. IT IS WONDERFUL. WHICHEVER WINS, WE KNOW IT WAS MEANT TO BE. IT IS ALL TO THE GLORY OF THE MOTHER OF MOTHERS.

"Is that your version of God?" I ask wearily.

IS THAT YOUR VERSION OF THE MOTHER OF MOTHERS?

"Whatever," I spit. "I should have known this wasn't getting me anywhere.”

BUT IT IS GETTING *ME* SOMEWHERE. SO THE TINY FLAVORS FOUGHT ME TO HAVE AN EMPTY EGG. I WAS EATEN BY THEM INSTEAD OF A SISTER. HOW STRANGE. I CANNOT SAY IT IS NOT AN INTERESTING END. DEATH BY DELICIOUSNESS. I DO NOT KNOW HOW THE MOTHER OF MOTHERS WOULD FEEL ABOUT IT, THOUGH.

"I know how _I_ feel about it," I tell her. "I'm glad. I'm glad nobody else is suffering because of you. I'm glad you're dead in here with me."

AH, she purrs, BUT TASTY TASTY SCHALA, ARE YOU GLAD *YOU'RE* DEAD IN HERE WITH ME?

That is the question, isn't it?

Was it worth it? If I could be assured that it was an either-or choice—that the only way to kill this creature was to create a timeline in which I was dragged in here with it—would I take that offer? Would I consider my own death a fair trade for a better future? And does it matter if I was never given a say in the matter?

Because everything to do with this beast rests on me. I should have done something sooner.

All my life I’ve known the right thing to do but been too afraid to do it. I tried. I tried to protect the people I cared about. But it was always too little, too late. If victory came in the end—for the living, for anyone who isn’t in this black prison—I’m not sure it was because of me.

Wasn’t that the case when I went down to the surface as a child with Melchior, a revered artificer, a Guru, whom my mother still then believed to be the right sort of person to keep me out of trouble? He went down to talk with some of the local elders, to trade with them for the metals he needed. I stepped into the Skyway thinking we’d be meeting some jeweled dignitary, nowhere near prepared for the blast of cold that hit me even in my parka as soon as we stepped out onto the surface. Melchior’s friend was a bedraggled, thin little man in ragged clothes, huddled in a cave with men and women and children who looked in even worse shape, taking shelter from the eternal storm. I saw people with frostbitten fingers, I saw disease and death for the first time. I saw a child twitching in feverish throes, unable to sense her mother’s touch. And I realized that while we lived up in the clouds, enriching our lives with our magic, debating obscure points of philosophy, there were people down here dying of starvation, of hypothermia, of diseases we knew how to cure. We were parasites on civilization with our false Enlightenment.

I knew all this, and I didn’t know how to change it. Oh, I thought I was so brilliant, so bold. I thought our forward-looking country would surely value my insight. I went to the robed philosophers of Enhasa. They yawned and told me we’d left the earthbound peoples’ dirty hides behind for our kingdom of dreams. I went to the spectacled scholars of Kajar. They snorted and told me that they weren’t interested in researching niche subjects like the nonmagical world. I went to the senators and jurors of the capital, and they adjusted their caps and told me I’d have a better sense for politics when I grew older. I sent them angry petitions until I heard they were using them for kindling. Belthasar, the Guru of Reason, tried to reason me out of my rage. The Nu were indifferent as ever. My mother didn’t hear a word I said. A few, like Melchior, felt as I did, winced when their travels took them below. But I couldn’t persuade most people we were in the wrong. I couldn’t persuade my mother. I felt Zeal Kingdom shrug off my every tirade and blow. So I fell silent. And came to ignore, as everyone did, the way our world was built on greed.

And wasn’t it just the same when I realized what was happening to my mother, to my country, as we pursued ever-increasing energy returns, as the old Sun Stones were drained of their power and left us looking to this leviathan at the bottom of the sea for another solution? How it became so painfully clear that we were toying with something we didn’t understand—all so that we could become not just kings, not just enlightened ones, but immortal gods? That my little brother Janus, who was only a boy, was cowering in terror from his own mother’s gaze? That he saw dark winds swirling around us? That we were plunging headlong into our ruin? I conspired with Melchior to delay and subvert my mother’s plans, but it wasn’t enough. It didn’t stop the beast from reaching back up our chains to throttle us, it didn’t take away the pain and fear in poor Janus’s eyes, and it didn’t stop the creature from scattering us across time and space when we found ourselves in its lidless gaze.

I tried. God knows I tried. I was encouraged when visitors showed up with the power of time at their command. The friends I came to love and trust. I talked with them a long time, learned where they’d come from. One was from the mists of prehistory; most were from a time long after our arrogant kingdom had faded from memory. All had seen a devastated future brought by the creature we were trying to exploit. They knew what the beast could do, would do. They hoped to stop it.

Still afraid to act directly, I opened doors for them instead. I snuck around, avoided my imperious mother and her goons and the Prophet who’d made himself her confidante all too quickly (yes, I _know_ what you were trying to do now, Janus, but I didn’t then. Anyway, it doesn’t matter now.) I told them what they needed to know. I hoped, I guess, that they could do what I’d failed to do. That a group of outsiders could bring our kingdom to its knees and slay our mammon monster and protect my brother, all at the same time, while I never had look my mother in the eye and tell her I didn’t trust her anymore.

They succeeded. I have to keep reminding myself that. Even though the confrontation nearly broke them, broke us all, they regrouped. They found a way to avert the death of their leader. They took everything they’d learned about magic from me, from all of us, and they plunged into the shell of the alien abomination, and they cut out its heart. The future it wanted never came to pass. Now it’s dead in here with me.

But was it _worth it?_

SCHALA.

Oh, shut up.

SCHALA, YOU ARE AVOIDING ME AGAIN.

Damn right. I’m pulling as hard as I can to escape the thing’s gravity. It’s taking all my effort to avoid falling into its maw. Screwing up my face, I turn further away from its cruel eye.

Her cruel eye.

SCHALA, YOU TASTY MORSEL, IF YOU JOIN WITH ME, GIVE ME YOUR MIND AND YOUR FLESH, YOU WILL BE GLAD OF IT. JUST SAY YOU WILL, AND I WILL MAKE THE WORLD SO BEAUTIFUL AND WONDERFUL FOR YOU. WE WILL FEAST TOGETHER. IT WILL BE DELICIOUS.

“No. I told you, I don’t want to be a part of you!”

JOIN WITH ME.

“No.”

JOIN WITH ME.

“No!”

YOU ARE BEING VERY IRRITATING. OH, WHAT A SOUR FLAVOR YOU HAVE.

“Why do you want me to join with you so badly?” I demand. “Why can’t you just leave me be?”

The Drinker’s answer comes more quickly than I was expecting. IF WE ARE TOGETHER, IF WE ARE ONE, WE CAN ESCAPE THIS PLACE. BOTH OF US. It sounds breathless.

I blink. “What do you mean?”

THIS PLACE IS A LIE. IT IS NOT PART OF THE WORLD. IT IS WHERE DRINKERS GO WHEN THEY HAVE BEEN BROKEN. WE HAVE BEEN THROWN OUT OF THE WAKE. THIS IS THE VOID, WHICH IS THE TRUE EATER OF THE EATEN. I HAVE NOTHING THAT CAN PULL ME OUT OF IT. BUT YOU MIGHT GIVE US BOTH AN ANCHOR TO THE REAL WORLD. THE REAL WAKE.

“What anchor?”

YOU HAVE A PIECE OF ME IN YOUR WORLD. AND YOU HAVE A PIECE OF ME IN YOU.

“You don’t mean—the Flame?” Centuries ago, we’d found an artifact, tapped its power to enhance our magic. It had made Zeal Kingdom possible. Only in my mother’s time did it become clear that it had some sort of connection to a beast living deep under the earth’s crust. Generations of Arbiters had channeled its power without apparent harm. But when I was forced to draw its power into our Mammon Machine, I began to feel uneasy. As if there was something alive twitching beneath me. As if it saw me. And yet I couldn’t look at my mother, standing over my shoulder, guiding my hand.

WHATEVER YOU CALL IT. LEAVING A BIT OF OURSELVES ON THE SURFACE IS A WELL-TESTED TECHNIQUE FOR US. IT ENRICHES YOUR FLAVOR AND MAKES THE EGG THAT MUCH MORE DELICIOUS. YOU FALSE DRINKERS THOUGHT YOU COULD USE IT TO DRINK FROM ME. HA. HA.

YOU WERE ITS KEEPER, SCHALA. YOU PASSED ITS POWER, MY POWER, THROUGH YOU. IT LEFT ITS TRACE. THERE IS A BIT OF ME IN YOU THAT WILL NEVER, EVER GO AWAY. THAT IS WHY YOU WERE PULLED IN HERE WITH ME. BUT IT WILL ALSO DRAW YOU BACK TO THAT SOURCE, THAT ANCHOR. THE PIECE IS STILL THERE, IN THE REAL AND SOLID WORLD.

YOU DO NOT HAVE THE STRENGTH TO SEIZE IT. I DO. BUT I DO NOT HAVE YOUR CLOSE CONNECTION TO IT. THE STAIN YOU KEEPERS LEFT UPON IT. YOU ARE THE KEY. IF WE WERE ONE CREATURE, WE COULD REACH OUT AND GRASP IT, PULL OURSELF BACK INTO THE BEATING HEART OF THE WAKE.

“But that would revive you!” I tell her. “That would undo everything my friends and I tried to do!”

EXACTLY.

“I think it should be obvious I won’t help you, then,” I snarl.

The Drinker is silent for a moment or two. I SHOULD NOT HAVE SAID THAT TO YOU. I SHOULD HAVE SAID SOMETHING FALSE AND PRETENDED IT WAS FACT. THEN YOU WOULD HAVE HELPED ME. IT WOULD HAVE BEEN A NEAT TRICK. OH WELL.

I turn away from her again, not saying anything.

COME NOW, SCHALA. WE WOULD BE GOOD PARTNERS. YOU ARE PART OF A DELICIOUS EGG. I AM ITS DRINKER. HAS THE UNIVERSE EVER MADE A MORE PERFECT COUPLE? YOU ARE MINE AND I LOVE YOU.

“You can’t be serious,” I sputter. “Planets don’t want you creatures burrowing your way into them. Nobody asked for you to exploit us. I’m not _yours._ I don’t love or even like you.”

THAT IS FINE. THAT IS HOW IT WORKS. I AM THE LOVER, YOU ARE THE BELOVED. WE SEE BEAUTIFUL EGGS OUT THERE IN THE UNIVERSE AND WE TAKE THEM. AND WE DANCE WITH THEM IN THE MOST GLORIOUS WAY ACROSS THE WAKE.

“That’s disgusting,” I say. “A parasite’s logic. Listen, it’s not right to use other people, other…planets that way. In a relationship, you’re supposed to think about what the other person wants, too. ”

A pause. Then she seems to light up. IF I DO WHAT THE OTHER ONE WANTS, THEY GIVE ME WHAT I WANT?

“That’s not what I meant—”

YOU DO NOT WANT TO BE ALONE HERE WITH ME. YOU WANT COMPANY. YOU WANT TO MATE IN THE FASHION OF YOUR KIND. NOT WITH DRINKERS OR PLANETS, BUT WITH OTHERS LIKE YOU. YOU WANT… The Drinker sounds out an unfamiliar word. HYUUUMUNNS. WHAT IF I GIVE YOU THIS ONE?

And suddenly, instead of the overwhelming presence of the Drinker, there’s a rush of air, and suddenly my mother is stumbling toward me in her long red robe, looking as bedraggled as she was when I last saw her, her eyes empty, reaching out for me with grasping hands—

“Get away!” I shout, falling back. Another rush of air, and the specter is gone.

THAT WAS WRONG?

“First of all,” I snarl, “you can’t do that with people’s family. Mothers and daughters aren’t compatible like that. It’s the wrong relationship.”

HOW STRANGE. IT WOULD NOT HAVE BOTHERED ME.

“And secondly,” I hiss, “How _dare you._ You have no right to her. You have no right to her face, her body, her clothing. You stole her from me.”

I DON’T THINK SO. SHE WANTED ME. SHE WAS LIKE MY HUMAN LOVER. SHE REACHED OUT TO ME WITHIN THE EGG AND SOUGHT ME, HER BELOVED, WHENEVER SHE COULD. THAT IS WHY I REMEMBER THAT ONE. SHE WAS HUNGRY.

“She got that way after _you_ took hold of her!”

She considers this. PERHAPS SO. PERHAPS A FALSE DRINKER WOULD FIND MY TASTE PLEASING. ADDICTIVE.

I stare at the darkness, fighting tears. How can I explain to her what it was like? Day after day, watching my mother turn into someone else.

She wasn’t always the cruel tyrant of Zeal Palace. Lachesis Zeal was once my mother. A real and proper mother. She was warm and kind to her children. My father was there, too. The two of them were hailed as shepherds of a new age of peace and prosperity in Zeal Kingdom. I played with my baby brother, and was well-loved, and was happy.

And when I told her that I wanted to be like her, a girl, radiant and beautiful, she listened to me very seriously and told me: “We have the power to do that in Zeal, my dearest.” She consulted her scholars and readied the magic and made sure all in the kingdom called me by my right name.

How can I compare that with the woman with cold fury in her eyes, who dragged me by the hair and pressed my face against the Mammon Machine, who had no qualms about turning a bolt of lightning on her own daughter or throwing her little son against the wall?

The one who did that wasn’t my mother at all.

This is not to say she was perfectly kind. All my life she was austere, reserved, regal. When I suggested once, back when she still had her mind, that we supply food to the earthbound sufferers, she laughed long and loud. I didn’t have the courage to tell her that I hadn’t been joking. But she had warmth for us. For her family.

The first hint of a change came when my father died. There was a disease in his flesh we could not cure: one of those malignant growths that our science still knows so little about. My mother stayed by his bedside all through his illness, held his hand and cried many times, tears leaving long streaks down her face.

When his suffering was over, she gathered some of her closest advisors, my brother, and myself in her office. She stood at the stained-glass window a long time while we waited in awkward silence. Finally she turned to me. “We thought we had created paradise here,” she said. “That was our goal. To make a society where we could live out our every dream. But we left something out. Do you know what we are missing here, Schala?”

“No, Mother,”

“Janus? Do you know?”

“No, I don’t, Mama,” he said, confused.

She turned back to the window. I could just barely see a tear glistening on her cheek. “Immortality.”

From then on, she never wanted anything else. And when she found a source of untapped energy beneath the ocean floor, her mind turned entirely to the task of harvesting and turning it to her aims. I do not know when she stopped being our loving mother. But one day, she didn’t know us anymore. She stared into the distance when she wasn’t near the Mammon Machine. She seemed stretched, thin. Hollowed out. As if there was a space in her that only the machine could fill.

And when I realized she was destroying us all, I couldn’t bring myself to stop her until it was too late.

“You erased her,” I tell the Drinker. “You scooped away all that made her herself.” And suddenly I realize where I’ve heard that imperious tone before, where I’ve felt that haughty stare. “She was _you_ , wasn’t she? You left her with nothing but hunger and need. You made her into you.”

I ADMIT I TASTED OF HER DEEPLY. THIS CREATURE WHO SO BADLY WANTED TO TASTE ME. SHE WANTED TO GIVE HER WHOLE SELF TO ME, ALL BUT THE HUNGER WE SHARED. IF THERE WAS NOT MUCH LEFT AFTERWARD, THAT IS HARDLY MY FAULT.

FINE. YOU DO NOT LIKE THE MEMORY. VERY WELL. HOW ABOUT THIS ONE?

And another image shows up before my eyes. It’s my brother Janus, and for a moment I believe it’s really him, after so long, I want to reach out to this little boy and take him up into my arms—then I realize that a little boy does not stare at his sister like that, and the illusion is broken.

“No,” I say, waving my hand. The image again disappears. “Brothers and sisters aren’t compatible, either.” And again, I’m gnashing my teeth. She obviously sensed how much I miss him. How much I think about him. I know that I failed my little brother.

I was supposed to keep him safe. Safe from our impending disaster, from my mother’s mindless rage. He was so scared—and I couldn’t protect him. God, how I tried to hold him tightly. But he slipped out of my grasp. I saw him falling, falling, falling—and then he was gone, cast across time and space like the rest of us. I’ve caught glimpses of him in a world where monsters roam. He doesn’t seem happy there. Better than our crumbling city, but still—he had to grow up in a world like that. I saw him grow more cold and isolated than he already was. He became obsessed with taking on the Drinker. He made a pledge of it in my name.

And I want to tell him: don’t think of me. All I wanted was to get you away from Zeal and all its dangers, and make you _safe._ And yet he follows me back in. I watch it happening over and over. He grows up, builds an army, loses it, returns to Zeal Palace grown, disguised as the Prophet, and tries to take the Drinker down. And even when he joins the heroes in slaying the monster, even after their task is done, he can’t be free of me. He’s still desperate to find me and save me. Forget about me, I want to say to him. Go and live and be free. I don’t want him to be haunted by my ghost. There’s nothing he can do for me now. But I can’t make him hear me. All I can do is glimpse him through the darkness, here beyond time, and wish I’d been a better sister.

YOU ARE VERY PICKY, says the Drinker. TO US, MOTHERS AND SISTERS ARE VERY IMPORTANT. LET ME SEE WHAT IS IN YOUR MIND ABOUT MATING.

“Don’t you dare!” I protest, blushing. But I can’t help but think about it, and thoughts echo in this place.

HOW ABOUT THIS ONE? I THINK YOU WOULD LIKE TO MATE WITH HER. 

I stare.

It’s Lucca.

“How did you—” I whisper. But I know how.

Lucca moves toward me. Slowly. Almost gently. Her movements are more careful and methodical. Her hair is green, for some reason. She doesn’t say anything. She just blinks twice and sits down beside me.

She picks up my hand as if unsure what to do with it. She lets it drop at my side again, and then puts her hand against the side of my face. Just the tips of her fingers touching me. This is a moment I’ve lived before, and I start to follow its rhythm. Slowly, gently, Lucca kisses me on the lips. It doesn’t make me think of the Drinker. It just feels familiar. Right.

I know where this moment comes from. I remember talking with Lucca, one long afternoon, while the other members of her team sought supplies in the city. She was fascinated by our magic and technology, wanted to know all about our methods and scientific terms. I told her everything I’d picked up from the Gurus, which wasn’t terribly much. She listened with a fascinated grin.

I found myself telling her about how different I’d felt as a child, like no one could understand me at all. I told her how I’d come into myself, only to fall into an entirely different isolation now.

She got very quiet when I mentioned that. “I guess I felt pretty similar,” she said. “I didn’t know how to deal with the fact that I wasn’t an ordinary sort of dresses-and-jewels girl. But then I realized that people would still like me even if I was myself.”

“Yes, your friends really care a great deal for you,” I said. “I’m jealous. I don’t know how one finds such close connections.”

She looked thoughtful. “Well, sometimes, you get lucky. And then, other times…you have to take a bit of a risk…and reach out.” She squeezed my hand. I leaned closer to her. Very slowly, we kissed.

And it doesn’t matter to me now that that moment didn’t go any further, because here it is now—hands are holding me and lips are pressing against mine, and I’m pressing against this warm body, and it’s pressing against mine, and it’s the Drinker who’s doing it, but I don’t care, because I want to get lost in this memory—

And then I remember what we said afterwards.

“I’m afraid,” I told her. “I have to do something to stop this madness, stop my mother—she isn’t human anymore, she isn’t making sense. But I’m terrified of standing against her.”

“That’s okay,” she said. “Half of the stuff I try to do scares me right out of my wits. It’s all right to be scared. Sometimes you just have to close your eyes and take a step forward, though. Because you know that you’re doing what’s right.”

And I feel the hands upon me, and suddenly they feel more like grasping, clutching claws.

“No!” I shout, and I push the false-Lucca away from me. She explodes in a puff of air, and suddenly the hot, heavy Drinker is there again.

WHAT IS IT NOW? I THOUGHT I HAD IT RIGHT.

“I don’t. Want. You.” I say between clenched teeth. “You took everything from me. My mother. My brother. Even _her_. I will not. Help you.”

I NEVER MEANT TO DO ANY OF THOSE THINGS, snarls the Drinker. I DO NOT OWE YOU ANYTHING.

I turn away.

REALLY, SCHALA? YOU WILL NOT DO THIS FOR ME? FOR BOTH OF US?

I don’t answer her.

VERY WELL. THEN YOU WILL BE DEAD DOWN HERE, FOREVER, WITH ME. IN THE COLD AND THE VOID AND THE DARK. IS THAT WHAT YOU WANT?

No, it isn’t. I don’t want to be here any more than she does. But I can’t let her win.

Maybe there’s another way.

I reach out beyond the veil, hoping for a glimpse. _Lucca,_ I think. _Where are you?_

After a long time, I find her. I see her. The real Lucca. It’s after the confrontation. She looks a bit older, now. Her hair is a bit longer. But she looks happy. She’s tinkering with a little metal man she built that sits on the table. Seeing her fills me with warmth, with peace.

If I could reach her, she could be my anchor.

I focus very carefully on her image. I’m going to cast a spell. The biggest one I know. It’s a sending spell. It’s meant to send messages. Ideas. I’m going to try for something more.

I’m going to send her my whole self.

SCHALA, roars the voice behind me. YOU ARE NOT LISTENING TO ME. WHY WON’T YOU JOIN WITH ME? WHY WON’T YOU LET ME HELP YOU? WHY WON’T YOU HELP ME?

I ignore her, and start working to cast the spell. I clutch the pendant I’ve always carried. It helped my friends win their fight. They say this kind of stone came to be to make dreams become real. Do I hear a voice in the real world crying out for me, or am I imagining it?

LOOK AT ME, LOOK AT ME, JOIN WITH ME. IF YOU DO WE WILL HAVE THE MOST BEAUTIFUL REVENGE ON THE WORLD. WE WILL EAT IT UP AND IT WILL BE SO DELICIOUS. YOU WILL LOVE IT. I PROMISE.

I’m ignoring her. It’s taking so much concentration to cast the spell and resist her pull at the same time, I barely hear her.

SCHALA. LOOK. I MADE THIS FOR YOU. She sounds desperate.

She thrusts something in front of me before I can turn away. It’s something not human. It has arms and eyes and a face and a torso, but it doesn’t look right. It has no nose, its mouth is covered with a film, and scaly plating covers its body. It stumbles and twitches horribly.

THIS IS WHAT WE ARE. I MADE THIS BECAUSE I LOVE YOUR EGG. I TOOK COILS FROM THE BLOOD OF EVERY CREATURE THAT EVER LIVED ON YOUR EGG. YOUR PLANET. I STUDIED THEM ALL AND LEARNED WHAT DELICIOUS PARTS I COULD ADD TO MYSELF. THIS IS WHAT I LOOK LIKE, BENEATH MY SHELL. THIS IS MY FACE. IT WAS WHAT I WOULD HAVE GIVEN TO MY SPAWN, TO TAKE WITH THEM ON THE INSIDE, ON THEIR LONG STAR-JOURNEY. IT IS MY TRIBUTE TO YOUR BEAUTIFUL FLAVOR. DON’T YOU SEE THAT I LOVE YOU?

I turn away.

I NEED YOU, SCHALA.

I close my eyes and concentrate.

I NEED YOU.

HELP ME.

IF YOU DO THIS SPELL, YOU WILL NOT NEED ME ANYMORE.

I WILL HAVE NO WAY OUT.

I WILL BE UNDONE.

I WILL DIE.

I DON’T WANT TO DIE.

I DON’T WANT TO DIE.

HELP ME.

PLEASE.

After a while, I stop hearing what she’s saying. It’s taking all my concentration to craft the spell and resist her gravity at once. Eventually she falls silent, perhaps realizing nothing she says will get through. A long, long time passes. Perhaps an hour.

Perhaps a century.

And suddenly, I know it’s done. I know I’ve put everything that is part of me into that spell, like a message. All my hope, all my love, all my dreams, all my gentleness. All the wishes I ever had for the better future. I feel something leaving me, huge and dazzling. It flies towards Lucca.

There’s a glow outside her window. She leaves and finds something outside. It’s a small shape. An infant child, crying. Her face looks something like mine. There’s a pendant around her neck. Lucca picks the crying child up, soothes her, cradles her, and takes her inside. The image fades into the black.

I’ve done it. I’ve done…something. I sent her me. Or a version of me. I did that much. Another version of me will be able to start over. Have a new life. That’s something. Even if I’d hoped I would be able to leave. Even if I wanted myself, and not a double, to escape.

I sink to the ground, exhausted. I’m sorry, Janus. I couldn’t reach out to you. Lucca was easier. Less sadness was in the way. Perhaps you and the younger me will meet again. Without all my guilt.

God. Oh god. I feel empty. I feel like there’s nothing left in me. Nothing good.

I’m hollow.

Like mother, like daughter, I guess.

I’m so tired. I thought I’d be free. I thought I’d be free. But I’m still trapped in the dark. I’m still here with the Drinker. There’s no way out. Only an offer I refused to take.

She’s silent, now. I can’t feel her pull. But I’m so tired, now, that I don’t think I could fight her if I did.

I don’t know what to do, except stare into the black. Until the end of time. But even that is beyond me. An end that will never come.

And then I hear…

Sobbing?

Something like it. Sharp sounds, sounds of sadness. Sounds of a creature sucking breath in pain. It’s very quiet. But it carries a long distance in the void.

I turn, and I see her.

She’s nothing now. Not even terrible. A pale, shriveled-up thing. Useless horns and spikes droop from her sides. She’s smaller than me now.

I go to her side.

…I HURT, she says quietly. I HURT. THE WAKE IS BROKEN AND IT HURTS ME.  YOU KILLED ME.

I don’t deny it.

ON ONE SIDE, I AM BORN. ON ANOTHER SIDE, I AM DYING. I AM HERE. EVERYWHERE, I HURT.

“I’m sorry,” I say.

She says nothing. I feel no pull.

And then I’m filled with anger. I’m angry that she should have to feel this. That I should. That I should die like this, alone forever in the dark. That she should be born into a world like this, where she has to be the creature she is, slain for going through her own life-cycle. That such a creature should have to exist, and be conscious. That its life should have to destroy our own. It isn’t fair. It isn’t remotely fair. And I’m so tired. So tired of all of this. There’s a hole in me that yearns for something better.

“Drinker,” I say, and I’m not sure where it comes from, but it makes sense to me. “I’m hurting, too.”

I reach out and touch her limp form, and touching her is not so terrible as I feared.

She looks up at me, uncertain.

“I want to share my hurt with you,” I say. She seems to understand.

There’s the tiniest, tiniest pull—

And I don’t resist.

And it’s like a kiss, it’s like the briefest touch between bodies. It’s connection, it’s reconciliation, it’s a friendship being kindled, it’s all that and more. It’s a warmth flowing into me and out of me. It’s not being alone in the dark.

Hands clasp mine. I don’t have to look to know whose they are.

And I feel us rising, up, up, up. I feel us growing together into one creature of impossible size and impossible majesty, I feel us rippling and changing in splendor. I feel us crawling up, up, up, with all our many limbs and tendrils bracing us, up out of a deep and unfathomable well. And I see all of space and time, the whole history of the world, the whole blue and beautiful Wake laid out before us. And I see an anchor, a Flame that kindled me, kindled the magic in me, calling us home, calling us back into being.

And I am hungry, and she is hungry, too. I am filled with hunger and thirst and wanting. And I can see, now, how wonderful life and light and genome taste when crushed between one’s jaws. I know exactly how our thirst will be sated. I reach out impossible hands to the Flame, and they are the Drinker’s own.

Everything that exists, we will devour.

OH, MY LOVE, YOU HAVE GIVEN ME SUCH A BEAUTIFUL THING.

Shhh. It’s all right, my love. I know.

I know.

**Author's Note:**

> Ideal musical accompaniment for the ending:
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxbq4QuzNPc


End file.
